Minato and Carrie
by Anime PJ
Summary: Minato Arisato is back from the dead. He is sent to Maine by the newly formed Shadow Operatives to recon for Shadow activity. What he finds there is a shy girl with a bad life, can he help her? Can he save Carrie White from herself? Minato/Carrie
1. Chapter 1

**Welcome to the updated chapters of Minato and Carrie! I'll admit, it took me way too long to get around to this, and I apologise for that. But I changed my mind about the whole third person thing, and I'm going back to the first person format. The writing is improved over the last attempt, but the overall story remains the same, and I hope you all enjoy it.**

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><p><span>Prelude to Disaster<span>

My name is Minato Arisato and, technically speaking, I'm a zombie. When I say that I don't mean that I'm wondering the Earth in a shambling mess eating people. No. It's more… _complicated _than that. Let me explain.

Over the year 2009 I found myself fighting against supernatural entities known as 'Shadows.' They were the physical incarnation of humanity's negative emotions, the things they hid from others and couldn't accept about themselves. In order to fight them, me and my friends in SEES (Specialised Extracurricular Execution Squad), used a power that was only available to a special group of people. The power of Persona. Personas are our Shadows; or at least they _would _have been our Shadows. The main difference being that our Personas are what happens when we accept those little, disgusting details as part of us, instead of rejecting them and denying they exist.

I am what is known as a Wild Card: A person with the capability to wield multiple Personas. Using this special ability, I protected my friends and allies as best I could. But, I'm afraid to say, I wasn't always successful. We lost people along the way: Shinjiro, Mitsuru's father, Chidori. Allies and friends that died in our war to save the Earth.

We went through betrayal as well as loss, which, in many ways, was worse to cope with. Shuji Ikutski was the advisor to SEES. He was also a backstabbing, two-faced son of a bitch. He was part of a group who wanted to release a Shadow known as Death in order to bring about The Fall: The end of the world. He killed Mitsuru's father when he tried to help us and then he reprogrammed Aigis, an android on our team, to kill us. Luckily for us, he was sent right off the top of Tartarus and was left a mangled, bloody mess in front of the school. Good riddance to the bastard is what I say.

The group of people Ikutski were working with, the ones who wanted to bring about The Fall, were called Strega. Takaya, Jin and Chidori. They started out as hitmen who accepted revenge requests and killed people during the Dark Hour, the time of day when the Shadows came out to play. We were lucky enough to capture Chidori when she had one of our own, Junpei, held captive at our base of operations. We spent quite a lot of time trying to get information out of her, but she was broken free by the other members of Strega. Though there was one thing Strega hadn't expected. Mind you, we hadn't expected it, either. But Chidori had fallen in love with Junpei, and vice-versa, during his many visits to her at the hospital we were holding her at. So when Takaya shot and killed Junpei, Chidori used her healing powers to bring him back from the dead. But, you see, there was a downside to Chidori's healing abilities. The damage healed on Junpei bounced back onto Chidori during the healing process, leading to her death as she resurrected my best friend.

The single biggest kick in the teeth at the hands of Strega came with the shooting of Shinjiro by Takaya. Ken, the youngest of our group, followed Shinjiro on the night of the full moon, while the rest of us were taking on a powerful Shadow. Ken was out to get revenge for his mother, who was killed in an incident years ago when Shinjiro's Persona went berserk. Shinjiro wasn't a natural Persona wielder, you see. He was part of an experiment to create artificial Persona users, which was unsuccessful due to the Personas being unstable and violent; the only way to keep the artificial Personas under control was to take a special kind of pill, but there was a catch. These pills were slowly killing him. When Ken found this out, he became distraught. His revenge had been taken from him because, whether he killed Shinjiro or not, Shinjiro was going to die anyway. Seeing that Ken wasn't going to do it, Takaya, who was watching the scene unfold, attempted to shoot Ken, only for Shinjiro to get in the way of the bullet. Shinjiro saved the life of one of our comrades, but died in the process.

I could sit here and list off all of the things that happened in 2009, but that would take absolutely ages. So, lets just get to where I come into all this. In 1999, ten years before these events, my parents died in an 'accident' on Moonlight Bridge. In 2009 I found out that this accident was in fact Aigis combating Death. The car was totalled in the crossfire, but I was still alive… if you could even call it alive. I spent the next ten years of my life not expressing a single emotion. I was just a blank slate. Over the course of the year 2009 SEES and I killed 12 Shadows that were different to the others, more powerful and only appearing during the full moon. The weird thing was… for every one of these Shadows we defeated, my emotions began to take shape. By the time we'd beaten the final one, I was just like any other teenager. And that's when I discovered the true reason behind my sudden return to Port Island.

I was Death. Or, more accurately, Death was sealed inside of me by Aigis after she determined that it was impossible for her to defeat. This made me realise why she felt such an attachment to me without really understanding why. The twelve Shadows we killed were each a different portion of Death's overall being, and when they were all defeated, Death became free of my body. In order to bring about The Fall, Death summoned an entity called Nyx with whom I engaged in battle. I fought off Nyx completely on my own, with only the cries of my comrades, my friends, to push me on. And when it became apparent that Nxy's immortality was indeed real, I did the only thing that I could. I gave up my soul in order to create and become the Great Seal, holding Nyx at bay, away from our world and saving it from destruction. I held onto my life for an entire month with no soul, so that I could keep my promise to my friends: to meet them on the day of graduation so that we could celebrate it together. On that day, I died peacefully on the roof of the school surrounded by the best friends I'd ever had.

…Then I woke up.

It was in the hospital a few days later, and I just couldn't figure out what was going on. I'd created that seal knowing that it was going to kill me, that I'd have to give up my life in order for the world to live on. I was later informed by Igor, a strange entity that resided in the Velvet Room, that this was a reward of sorts for my selfless actions. The seal remained in place, and I was still alive.

And that's when the next hectic chapter of my life began.

~Minato and Carrie~

"Shadow Operatives?" I asked as I looked at the file Mitsuru had given me.

Across from me sat Mitsuru Kirijo, new head of the Kirijo Group after her father's untimely death. She had long, flowing crimson hair, matching eyes, pale skin and a figure that most women would positively _kill _for. She wore what I assumed was her business attire, consisting of a white dress shirt and tie, accompanied by a knee-length black shirt. "Yes," she told me from her seat. "The ex-members of SEES all still have the ability to wield a Persona, even though the Dark Hour is no more. Port Island may have been the main source of Shadow activity, but we've found that there are small pockets of it all around the world. If we act before these small infestations get any bigger, then we may be able to end this for good."

"Well, I'm in," I accepted without really having to think about it. "Those things have pretty much been my life since I was six years old. It would be nice to finally put all of this to bed."

"Then you should have no problem doing a little recon in America," she said with a smirk directed at me. I raised my eyebrow in response.

"America?"

"Specifically Maine," she told me. "Check in the file, page five, the details are all on there." I opened the file to the correct page and saw the name of the small town she'd be sending me to.

_Chamberlain_

"What's so important about this place?" I asked out of curiosity. It looked like your run-of-the-mill, small town to me.

"Most of the Shadow activity we've discovered outside of Port Island has been in small towns just like this one," she informed me with a serious tone of voice. "There was also an unexplained incident there years ago, in which the town's weather took on a rather unusual characteristic. It began to rain stones."

"Stones?" I asked. That didn't sound like the Shadows' MO.

"Indeed," she confirmed with a nod of her head. "No explanation. Nothing. There was a large amount of psychic energy in the area at the time, and the strangest thing was that the stones only fell around one house."

"That is strange," I said with a click of my tongue. "So, when do I leave?"

"Next week," she told me. "You'll be enrolled in the high school there, and you're to look for anything suspicious. The girl who lives in that house also attends the school. If you can, then get the information about the stones from her." I looked into the files again and saw the names of the house's owner and her teenage daughter.

_Margaret White_

_Carrie White_

They looked like a perfectly ordinary, single mother and daughter. There was a little in there about Margaret being a bit of a zealot, but that was hardly new; every town has one. _This'll be over and done with in no time, _I thought to myself with a smile. "Okay, I'll look over this and be at the airport next week," I said with a smile before saying my goodbyes to Mitsuru and leaving the office. _Small town, quiet environment, school. How bad could it be?_

…

…

…

_Fuck!_

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><p><strong>Well, there you have it! The first updated chapter of Minato and Carrie! I hope you enjoyed it, since it's a vast improvement on the original, and I look forward to having you read the rest of it.<strong>

**Next Chapter: The Arrival and the Video**


	2. Chapter 2

**Welcome to chapter 2 of the updated 'Minato and Carrie'! I'm really glad to be getting back into this, since my writing has much improved since I announced the rewrite would be taking place, and I'm really looking forward to getting through this!**

**Let the story commence!**

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><p><span>The Arrival and the Video<span>

You'd think that a whole year of fighting demonic entities would make me more comfortable with flying. Well if you thought something like that, I'm sorry to tell you how dead wrong you are. I was sat there, headphones covering my ears, _Burn My Dread _blasting through as a way of distracting me from the rather harrowing experience that is air travel. It definitely worked. This music really brought back memories: It was the song I was listening to on the train to Port Island back when I had the emotional complexity of a robot (hell, I actually _know _a robot now, and she's got more emotions than I used to!). It … all seemed so long ago as I thought about it.

In a further attempt to distract myself from the sense of impending doom (which I couldn't help but suspect had more to it than a fear of flying) I was taking another look through the stuff that Mitsuru had given me. It still baffled me that she seemed to think recon was needed for this. If I'm being honest, I didn't see any evidence to suggest that anything of note was really going on in Chamberlain. Some stones fell from the sky, whoop-de-fucking-do! Weird shit happens all the time in other places, what made this place so special?

I decided to mull that over some other time and head to the plane bathroom, the worried feeling taking its toll on me, as well as me actually kind of needing a piss. I looked in the bathroom mirror and gazed at the 17-year-old boy that it reflected. The dark, night-blue hair that grew over the right eye. The one visible eye, a bright silver orb with a black centre. I smiled fondly at my reflection; it would probably look weird in the US, but I didn't give a fuck. I liked the way I looked.

After doing my business and splashing some water on my face, I returned to my seat on the plane. _Only an hour to go, _I thought. _I hope I can get some God-damned peace in this town. It certainly looks like a pleasant enough place._

I found out pretty quickly just how wrong I was.

~Minato and Carrie~

When the plane landed I was very relieved to be able to exit with the other passengers. I hadn't landed in Chamberlain, since they didn't have an airport—I was going to have to drive there. _How, _you may ask, _when you don't even have a car? _That, my friends, is one of the benefits of having the head of the Kirijo Group as a friend; Mitsuru had arranged for a car to be brought to the airport for me. I'd already taken and passed my driver's test, so there was no need to worry about that sort of thing.

I got outside and looked for any indication of where my car may be. I found one pretty quickly; there as a young black man—looked to be in his early twenties—standing in the middle of the airport, wearing a suit and a pair of sunglasses, holding up a sign that read _Minato Arisato. _

I approached him. "Hey, you the guy who's bringing me my car?" I asked him. I knew English, of course, it would have made no sense to send me to America if I didn't. Mitsuru wasn't anywhere near stupid enough to make a mistake like that.

"You Mr Arisato?" he asked me. I nodded in the affirmative. "Then yeah, man. The name's Argon. Nice to meet you." He held out his hand, which I accepted and shook gladly.

"Likewise," I said with a smile. I could tell already that I liked Argon. He did his job the way it should be done, but didn't take it too seriously. He had an upbeat air about him that made me feel at home despite being so far away from it.

"I gotta say, man," he said in a conversational tone as he lead me across the parking lot, "the car you got here is a hell of a machine. I got one myself at home."

"And what car would that be?" I asked as he drew to a stop, myself doing the same beside him.

"Right here." He pointed it out with a large smile and handed me the keys. I looked in the direction of the car he was pointing at, and after a few seconds I thought: _Son of a bitch … is that a PRIUS!?_

"Are you kidding me?" I asked incredulously. It was small and dark blue to match my hair, but the fact that it was a Prius forced my mind to ignore any of the other details. "No offence or anything, Argon, but everything I've heard about these things makes them sound like a pile of shit."

"Nah, man," he said in what I assume was an attempt to reassure me. "That's just what them bastards who think they're above 'em want people to think. So, listen, I gotta go." He handed me a business card with his name on it and a phone number. "I drive a limo, too. If you ever need one then look me up. I don't care where it is, I'll get to you. See you later, man." He walked off and got into a small taxi, driving off with a couple of honks on the horn in farewell.

Once again I thought about how Argon just seemed naturally likeable.

Sighing to myself, I saw that my options were limited to only the one in front of me. I got into the Prius and began the long drive to Chamberlain.

~Minato and Carrie~

You know something? I was wrong; Priuses were fucking _awesome_! It may have been really small and slightly shitty looking, but it was _fast_. The house that Mitsuru had gotten rented out for me was just across the street from the White Residence, so surveillance wasn't going to be an issue. I suppose we were really lucky that there happened to be a house available on their street.

I didn't have anything to do on this first day except for going to school, which was only for an hour in order to get a tour around the place before I started. As such, I used the few hours I had before that time in order to move what little stuff I had into the house and get settled in.

I sat down and opened the suitcase that contained my equipment. In the case was my Evoker—a gun-like device that was used to summon a Persona—an _actual _revolver in case I got into trouble with the locals, and the golden hilt of a sword.

I smiled lightly. That sword is one of my most prized possessions. It can only be used by me, which is why it only took the appearance of a hilt, and had the spirit of the Archangel Michael embedded in it. The name of the sword was Deus Xiphos and, trust me, it was a massive bitch to get a hold of.

I stuffed all of it into the pockets on the inside of my jacket and continued on unpacking my stuff and getting the house in order. When I was done I looked at the clock and saw that it was time for me to head to the school and get my tour. The tour was organised by Mitsuru (who I was beginning to think could do fucking _anything_) as a way of getting to know my surroundings for the mission.

I hopped into the Prius and began to drive to the school. I was getting a few odd looks from people I passed because of the car, but I didn't give a shit. I had a job to do, so it wasn't as if these people's opinions would matter in the long run. As I was driving I began to wonder, once again, why I was even here. _Are falling stones really that good a reason for recon? _I thought. I made a mental note to call Mitsuru about it later on in the day.

I arrived at the high school after a five minute drive and parked in the crowded parking lot—most of the cars probably belonged to the students, I reasoned. I didn't think I would be there long, nor did I think it would be that eventful a visit, so I walked in with an expression of mind-numbing boredom written all over my face. I approached the woman sat at the reception desk.

"Excuse me," I said. She looked up at me with a smile. "I'm the new student from Japan, Minato Arisato. Someone should be expecting me."

She smiled and turned her face to the computer. She clicked and typed a few things before turning back to face me again. "The principle's office is just down the hall," she said.

"Thank you." I walked down the corridor she had pointed out and found the door marked _Principle Norton _at the end of the hall. I knocked on the door, and someone on the other side said, "Come in." I did as bid and walked inside. "Hello," I said as I walked inside. "I'm the transfer student from Japan, and I—" I could see very clearly that I had interrupted something. There was the principle sat behind the desk, along with a muscular woman who I assumed to be the gym teacher and a girl about my age with pretty blonde hair and a nervous facial expression. "If I'm interrupting something I can just come back later …" I started to exit the room.

"No no," the principle said, stopping me in my tracks. "We'll be done in a minute. Just have to sort out this issue." He turned back to the other two—both of whom had taken curious looks at me when I entered, the woman more than the girl—and apparently didn't mind me being present for this. "Now, who was it that started throwing … _things_?" he asked with much hesitation in his tone. Whatever the subject was, it was making him very uncomfortable.

"It was Chris Hargensen and her friends," the woman said in anger.

The principle turned to look at the girl. "Casey—"

"Carrie," the woman corrected him. My eyes widened a little. Was this the same Carrie that I was supposed to be keeping an eye on?

"… Carrie," the principle said, continuing on from where he was interrupted, "did Chris Hargensen start this?"

"I don't mean to interrupt, but should I really be here for this?" I said. "This just seems a little too … well, private, for me to be present right now."

"It's fine," the principle said, waving me off. "It's just a little situation—"

"They started throwing tampons at her in the showers," the woman said, even more visibly angry now. "That isn't a _little _situation."

"They did _what_?" I asked in disgust. "Holy shit—pardon my French—that's just … _horrible. _Are you all right?" I directed the question at Carrie, who visibly shied away upon being spoken to.

"Thank you!" the woman said in some relief. "At least _someone _agrees with me." She turned back to Carrie, who was now giving me a curious look. It almost looked like someone defending her was an entirely new concept … and that saddened me. "Now, Carrie," the woman continued, "you don't need to defend them. What they did was unforgivable." Carrie remained silent and looked increasingly nervous and uncomfortable.

"Okay, look," the principle said with a sigh. "It doesn't look like … Carrie is gonna point the finger. Ms Desjardin, I need you to get to the bottom of this. Make the punishment fit the crime." He waved his hand and I frowned. This man clearly wasn't interested in anything that was happening here. _What the hell is wrong with these people? _I thought.

"Okay," the woman—whom I now knew as Ms Desjardin—said with a nod of her head. "Now, Carrie, you're excused from P.E. class for the rest of the week. Just make sure you take Study Hall, okay? At the library."

"Yeah," the principle agreed. "We're gonna have to call your mom." I didn't know what it was about that statement, but it made Carrie tense up quite badly.

"What?" she asked with a shake to her voice. It was the first time I'd heard her speak; I liked her voice, it sounded nice.

"We're gonna have to call your mother," the principle said again. "Carrie, I … I know she's had problems with us in the past, ever since the state stopped her from home-schooling you any more. But … we've got to bring her in on this."

I was only just able to keep track of everything he was saying, due to the fact that Carrie had been shaking her head and saying, "No," to herself ever since they'd mentioned her mother. She both looked and sounded pretty terrified. I began to wonder what kind of person her mother was, to strike such fear into her own daughter.

"We have no choice," Ms Desjardin said in a reassuring tone. "We have to tell your mom."

"No," Carrie said once again, a little louder this time. And, at that exact moment, the class container on top of the water-cooler shattered, spreading glass and water all over the floor of the office. The two teachers stood with a start, whereas I looked on in shock. Carrie abruptly stood up and left the room as quickly as she could without running, though I did notice the curious glance she gave me as she left.

The teachers may have been confused, but I'd seen enough weird shit in the last year that I was able to put the pieces together really quickly. And, with that in mind, I thought, _Did she do that?_

"You … er, Minato," the principle said, turning my attention back to the two teachers in the room. He was looking into a folder; I assumed he was looking for my name, seeing as he'd shown such a talent for forgetting them. "Seeing as Ms Desjardin doesn't have any more classes for the day, I'll have her show you around."

I nodded. "Thank you," I said politely. I looked towards Ms Desjardin with an easy smile on my face. "Lead the way, Teach." She smiled back, apparently appreciating that I wasn't trying to be disrespectful, and proceeded to show me around the school.

~Minato and Carrie~

After my tour of the school I just headed back to my house. The school wasn't that hard to get down; hell, it was certainly less complicated than any school I'd been to in Japan. Ms Desjardin was a nice teacher, too. I was starting to think that I might actually like this small town.

I sat down on the sofa and got my laptop out. It was time to ask Mitsuru the questions I'd been dying to ask all day. I logged on to the Shadow Operatives' secret website (I was just as surprised that we had one of those as you are, trust me) and started messaging her.

_Minato: Is there a real reason I'm here? Falling stones doesn't seem like much to go on, especially for you._

_Mitsuru: Honestly? Looking at all the things you did last year, I thought you could use a break. So I found the most peaceful place I could find an excuse for investigating and sent you there._

_Minato: Thanks, I do appreciate it. But … there may be more going on here than you think there is._

_Mitsuru: What do you mean?_

_Minato: I met that girl, Carrie, when I was touring the school. She got a little emotional and a water-cooler smashed behind her. It could be just a coincidence, but that would be very convenient timing._

_Mitsuru: Interesting. Keep an eye on her until you have some definite evidence. And try to relax, too._

_Minato: Will do. Over and out._

I lay my head back on the sofa and sighed. My apparent time off may not last as long as Mitsuru intended if this theory of mine turned out to be correct. But as my thoughts strayed to the conversation I'd walked on in in the office, I couldn't help but wonder how anyone could treat someone so cruelly.

I shook my head and changed website to YouTube. I needed to watch something funny to calm me down, and YouTube as always full to the brim with funny stuff. I got onto the website and looked up the recent uploads to see if anything good had been put on recently. I scrolled down the page and stopped on one particular video. The thumbnail showed a face that I'd seen earlier that day: Carrie White. And it looked like she was crying.

I clicked on the video, hoping to God that it wasn't what I thought it was, and was brought to a scene in a school shower. A large group of girls was surrounding Carrie, who was bleeding from … places, and they were throwing tampons at her. They were chanting, "Plug it up!" as they did so, and the poor girl was clearly in a lot of distress.

My senses were clouded by a massive amount of rage and only one thing could be said for these sick fucks. "You sick little cunts," I growled.

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><p><strong>And there you have it, folks! The second edited chapter! I know these are taking a while, and I'm sorry about that, but I've gotten into the bad habit of working on everything at once.<strong>

**Next Chapter: Meeting and Investigation**


	3. Chapter 3

**Welcome to chapter 3 of 'Minato and Carrie'. I hope you're enjoying it so far because I've got more in store for you!**

**I've got a couple of review so far and I'm glad to see that I'm doing this right. I'd like to say that I am in fact going to be taking this story slowly. The idea has been in my head for a while but I saw how big a risk it was to do this. This is the kind of story that's easy to mess up and I want to do it well, so I plan on really thinking this thing through before uploading each chapter.**

**I do not own the poem 'A Good Man Goes to War'. The poem belongs to the writers of Doctor Who. I simply use it for Minato's own poem scene, with one tweak.**

**Let's begin.**

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><p><span>Meeting and Investigation<span>

_I was flying. Up and up and up. Up towards the gargantuan creature that had emerged from the moon. I knew what I had to do but that didn't make me any less afraid. I'd just gotten my life together the way it should have been yet... I didn't want to think about it._

_I could hear my friends calling to me down below. Yukari, Mitsuru, Junpei, Akihiko, Fuuka, Ken, Aigis, even Koromaru was barking his little head off. _

_I landed in front of the creature, a mere mist in front of my eyes. I saw it and I was terrified. I wanted to run and hide but I knew I couldn't. It was going to end like this from the very beginning. I think I knew the entire time that this is how it would end for me. I just never wanted to admit it._

_I drew Deus Xiphos and stared at the monster with pure hate. Most of my life had been death and emptiness. And when you got down to it, this thing was the cause of all of it. I saw it form the purple ball of energy surrounded by darkness but I did not move. I'd come to far. I'd lost too much to give up here._

_"Come on then you bitch." I hissed at it._

_The ball was on me in seconds and I felt the dark power of the thing within. Any normal person would've died. Any other Persona user would've died. But not me. I had the power that my friends had given me with our bonds to one another. I was their strength and they, mine. I stood there and gave the thing a look that said 'is that all you got!?'_

_It hit me with the energy again and again. The pain was unbearable but I held on. I had to. I was the one who was going to stop it. Put and end to The Fall. This thing wasn't going to hurt anyone else!_

_I raised my hand and pointed a finger at the gigantic creature. "Great Seal." Were the only two words that left my mouth as power that once surged through me, life that once surged through me, left my body and bound the creature behind a giant stone door. For the rest of time..._

_Everything faded as I fell. Fell towards the Earth. Back towards my allies._

~Minato and Carrie~

I awoke with a start in the middle of the night. _That was... that was the night I sealed Nyx. _I'd been having nightmares about it since it happened, they were never quite so vivid as that though. What's different?

I couldn't think of any reason why the dreams became so clear all of a sudden. I could tell that it was going to be on my mind for a while so rather than agonize over it at the time, I thought I'd do my job. Mitsuru had left me some equipment that picks up on the energy Shadows produce. It's undetectable to most people but this stuff is especially designed to pick it up.

It looked something like a giga-counter with a little screen underneath the counter. The screen itself creates a map of the area around me as I explore it and places little red dots in the areas where the Shadows are. We used them all the time back in SEES. Well, we used the map bit. There wasn't really much need for the counter as we already knew where all the Shadows on the island were most of the time.

I got dressed and exited my house with the counter. I activated it the second I got outdoors and what I found astounded me. The gauge on the counter was three quarters to the max! There was that much Shadow activity in a small place like this!? There were so many questions running through my head but one stood out among the others: if there are so many Shadows here, then why weren't they out attacking people?

Last time the Shadows caused problems they would use something called The Dark Hour to put humans into a dormant state where they became coffin-like objects. They would leave certain people awake and then feast on them, leaving them in a near catatonic state for the rest of their lives. We Persona users were the only ones able to stay awake during The Dark Hour without the Shadows coming after us. There was no Dark Hour in Chamberlain. At least not from what I'd seen. So where the fuck were all the goddamn Shadows!?

I sighed in annoyance at all the unanswered questions. _Looks like my stay's been extended _I thought. I approached the White's residence across the street, taking care to be quiet. I held the counter against the house and the gauge shot to the maximum it could go and it was trying to go further. _Holy shit... _Carrie White's house was a fucking hot-spot for Shadow activity! But that once again begged the question of why they hadn't made themselves known.

I decided to go back to my house, get some sleep and then mull it over in school the next day. The Whites had survived in that place for this long so I figured I could leave them for a night. If I was correct then it was clear that nothing knew it'd been discovered yet. That worked to my advantage.

I got into the house and went to the fridge. I pulled out a bottle of whiskey. Don't ask me where I got it, that's not important. I only really drank it when the nightmares got too much to handle. And even then I only had half a glass. It's not that bad, right? I mean, it does help me sleep when I need the extra help.

I drank from the glass of whiskey as I thought back to the events of the day. _Those kids are sick and twisted. That poor girl must feel terrible... that's it! _A wave of determination flowed over me. _It's clear that she needs someone to help her with all the shit, so I'll be her friend. Build up her confidence so she can stand up for herself._

It was perfect. I had a secondary goal to balance out my primary mission. I had to do something at least relatively normal while I was in Chamberlain otherwise Mitsuru would bitch me out for not relaxing. Plus, after watching that video... it just wouldn't feel right to leave her on her own. Something had to be done and it didn't look like anyone else gave a shit.

I was going to help Carrie White.

Not that I hadn't planned on it anyway. Helping people is what I do best.

~Minato and Carrie~

The drive to school wasn't as peaceful as the last one. Mostly because there were other cars on the road now.

I was thinking about it and Mitsuru had said that the equipment wasn't 100% proven to work yet so I could still be wrong about all the Shadow activity. Then there was the other matter.

Carrie White.

Good God, I needed to help her. That look in her eyes when I saw her in the office was heartbreaking, that expression that said she wasn't used to even relatively friendly gestures. Then there was the video. I wasn't going to speak to any of those people unless I had no other choice. This entire thing was about making Carrie feel better and I'd be damned if I wasn't going to do just that.

I never knew where the urge to help people came from. It was just something I had my whole life, if someone needed help with their life I'd give it. I made friends with a dying man in his final weeks. I helped a monk get his marriage in order and give up his drinking problem. Hell, I unknowingly helped my teacher appreciate her job (that one ended a bit weirdly though). It was just something I couldn't help doing.

I think I had the curiosity about what happened the day before to help with the motivation to get to know Carrie. A water cooler doesn't just smash on its own and her emotional outburst coincided perfectly with the moment that it did. Even if it wasn't Shadows there was definitely something going on here. I wouldn't be very good at my job if I didn't find out what.

After all, without this job what use am I? The only reason I was considered so special before was because Death itself was living inside me. Unless I made myself useful there would be no point to have me around.

I shook my head of those thoughts. This wasn't the time to be negative. I started thinking about the class assignment I'd been given for literature class the day before. I'd been given the homework the rest of the class had been given so that I'd be prepared as the rest of them. We had to bring in a poem of some sort.

I was never really into poetry. It never really appealed to me on many levels. There were a few that I liked but it was hard to pick between them since they all registered in my mind as something that spoke to me in a way that no other poems could.

I smiled to myself as my internal dilemma was solved. I knew what I was going to bring into class.

I unknowingly passed a certain lonely blonde girl walking down the road to school. Carrie White was someone I'd come to be quite familiar with over the next month.

~Minato and Carrie~

Speaking of Carrie. It turned out that the only class I had with her on that day was the Literature class. The world works in weird ways, doesn't it?

I was bored. Very bored. I ended up just blankly staring out of the window. It was a nice day outside. Plenty of sunshine, no clouds, no rain, no wind. Well, I thought there was no wind. No leaves were rustling on the trees or anything but for some reason a flag started blowing. Weird.

I was brought out of my stupor when the teacher called out a name of interest. "Carrie." He called from his desk. "Do you have your poem? Did you bring one?"

A few of the students in the class started giggling. I guess he'd called on her a few times. There was one thing I was picking up from this experience so far. American kids are assholes.

After a few moments silence she nervously replied. "Yeah..."

"Why don't you come up to the front of the class and share it with us?" The teacher suggested.

She stood up nervously and slowly walked to the front of the class. I could tell from my seat that she was just barely keeping herself composed in front of so many people.

"This un..." She hesitated. "this unfrequented place to find some ease, ease to the body some, none to the mind, times past and what once i was and what am now O wherefore was my birth from heaven foretold, twice by an angel, who at last in sight of both my parents all in flames ascended."

After a few more moments of silence the teacher spoke up. "Okay, that was uh... disturbing. That is the most you've said in class all year. Is there more you'd like to share, or are you done scaring us for the day?"

"Asshole." I coughed into my hand.

"Excuse me, mister..." He looked at the class register. "Arisato. Did you say something?"

"I said awesome." I told him with a smirk. "I thought the poem Carrie read was awesome. Didn't you, sir?" The entire class was staring at me in shock at this point, but none more so than Carrie herself.

The teacher didn't have anything to say back to me so simply settled with. "Why don't you share something, mister Arisato?"

"Okay." I shrugged and got up in front of the class as Carrie sat down. I cleared my throat. "Demons run when a good man goes to war, night will fall and drown in sun, when a good man goes to war, friendship dies and true love lies, night will fall and the dark will rise, when a good man goes to war, demons run but count the cost, the battle's won but innocence is lost, when a good man goes to war."

The class was once again silent. "Another weirdo... great..." I heard the teacher mumble under his breath. I flashed him the middle finger behind my back as I went back to my desk.

I sat down in my seat again and smiled at what I'd just done. If even the teachers were doing this shit then I had my work really cut out for me. I was so busy contemplating how to approach Carrie for a conversation that I didn't notice said girl taking curious glances at me throughout the rest of the lesson.

Nor did I realize I had just entered myself into the planning of a regretful former-tormentor.

~Minato and Carrie~

The bell rang for the end of class and Carrie hurried out the door. That was fine. I hadn't thought of how to start up that conversation yet anyhow.

I was on my way out of the classroom when I was stopped by someone. It was a young man with dark brown hair, bordering on black. He was wearing one of those jersey's that high school jocks normally wear so I could tell he was a sport-loving kind of guy.

Next to him was a girl with long blonde hair. She was quite pretty and had a sort of regretful air about her. I recognized her after a few seconds. She was one of the girls in the shower from that video!

"Hey, how's it going?" The guy asked. "I'm Tommy. Tommy Ross. You're the new kid... Arisato, wasn't it?"

"Minato Arisato." I told him.

"Sounds foreign, where are you from?"

"Japan."

"Heh, thought so." He pulled the blonde girl forwards to introduce me. "This is my girlfriend, Sue Snell. I figured you, being the new kid, would need some people to hang out with. You up for it?"

I thought it over for a moment. "Sure." I responded. I was a little wary of Sue because of the video, but Tommy seemed like a nice enough guy. Plus, I know regret when I see it so I could tell she was sorry for what she did. Only time would tell whether or not she made up for it.

"What brought you down to the States?" Tommy asked me as we walked to our next class. Which, oddly enough, we had together.

"Needed a change of scenery." I half-lied to him.

"Do you tend to stick up for people a lot?" Sue asked out of the blue. I could tell right away that she was referring to the incident in the classroom.

"Yeah," I told her. "Someone's got to do it. It just seems like I'm the only one who gives a shit."

"Damn straight." Tommy praised. "If you hadn't done it, I fucking would've."

"It's just a matter of seeing everyone as human beings and not your own personal performing monkeys." I told them both, trying to slip a little lecture for Sue in on the sly. "Every human being has their limits. One act of kindness is sometimes all it takes to make sure they never reach those limits." And I should know. I spent all of the last year helping people.

We arrived at the classroom. "This has been an enlightening conversation." Tommy comments. "Catch you after class, Minato?"

"Yep." I replied simply before entering the classroom. I hoped that I'd given Sue something to think about.

~Minato and Carrie~

Home once again. I spent a little time hanging out with Tommy and Sue after school but not all that much. I still had a job to do after all. Sue kept asking me stuff about Carrie, which I told her I didn't know a lot of since I hadn't really spoken to her yet.

I wondered why Sue wanted my opinion on Carrie? I told her that I thought she seemed like a nice girl and she seemed to start thinking about something. Weird.

I was getting on my laptop to continue emailing Mitsuru. She needed to know about all the Shadow energy even if it was only faulty equipment. If it turned out to be the real deal then I wanted to be prepared.

_Minato: How accurate would you say the equipment it?_

_Mitsuru: Not very, it's only just come out of the lab. There are still a few bugs but it's the best we've got._

_Minato: Right, 'cause I scanned the area earlier and the Shadow energy flowing through this place was off the damn charts! Specifically around the White's residence._

_Mitsuru: I wouldn't worry about it, the equipment isn't as reliable as we'd like yet. I'll try and send you the improved version when it gets finished. For now just rest, that's why I sent you out there after all._

_Minato: OK, thnx._

I couldn't be bothered to type anymore so I settled for a quick goodbye. I looked at my bed longingly and realized just how much sleep I'd missed out on earlier in the day. I flopped out on my bed, promising that I would have a lasting conversation with Carrie White before the week was up.

Jesus Christ, if only I'd seen what I did the next day coming.

* * *

><p><strong>There you have it. I have the plot pretty much done in my notes now and it's looking good. The updates won't come out very quickly because I have other stories to do as well but don't worry, they'll come.<strong>

**Next Chapter: The Fateful Favor**


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